Tasty Tuesday: Veniero's

Beautiful ceiling inside Veniero's

On my recent holiday jaunt to New York, I was taken to this charming little Italian café near Union Square called

Tasty Tuesday: La Bamboche

Left: Cassis & Earl Grey Cake  Right: Matcha (Green Tea) & Sesame Cake

I've been known to go bakery-hopping once in a while, and the most number of bakeries I've hit in a go was four.  For a city as large as Toronto, where things are so spread out, it was no easy feat!  Sometimes, I'm on a hunt for something specific -

Tasty Tuesday/Cupcake Chronicles: Bobbette & Belle

$2.95 each - Top L-R: red velvet, raspberry, mango | Bottom L-R: cookies & cream, chocolate, (and I think) apple spice

The Cupcake Chronicles have become something of a life mission.  I’m still looking for the best cupcake in Toronto, only it’s expanded – I’m also looking for the best cupcake in every city that I visit, if they’re available.

On this edition of the CC, I try the offerings from Bobette & Belle, a pretty well-known bakery down at the Beaches.  A lot of my fellow foodists have been wanting to make the trip down there

Tasty Tuesday: Pret A Manger Chocolate Chip Cookie

Famous chocolate chip cookie from Pret-A-Manger

Doesn't that look sinfully delicious?  But first, some housekeeping.

From the messages I keep getting from everyone, it's clear that a lot of people have not caught onto the new posting schedule yet!  So to explain it once and for all, on Sundays I post essays about all kinds of things and issues that matter to me, on Tuesdays I post about food, and on Thursdays I post about beauty products, although so far I've focused only on nail polish.  And then occasionally there will be a non-scheduled post here or there.

Back to that beautiful chocolate chip cookie.  Now that I'm

Tasty Tuesday/Cupcake Chronicles: Magnolia Bakery

excited to taste my purchases! :D

1.) Happy Back to School to all of you who are still in school!  Here's to a year of good grades, lots of fun extracurrics, minimal stress and sufficient sleep! :D

2.) I love cupcakes and I love Sex & the City (the TV show, not the movie).  Thus, it was only logical and right for me to visit Magnolia Bakery, the cupcake shop in SATC.  I thought that there was only one shop in Manhattan in Chelsea (or was it the West Village?), but one day on our way to 30 Rock, we saw a line wrapped around the corner of a building under the sign, Magnolia Bakery!  Naturally,

Tasty Tuesday/Food Fail: Cafe Maxim's Patisserie

Dearest readers,

I hope you all had a fantastic weekend!  This is the first Mother's Day where I have a steady income and can actually afford to hold something of a celebration with Superwoman, so I asked her early on where she'd like to eat.

"Oh! I haven't actually thought about Mother's Day!" She said with an innocent flutter of her eyelashes before producing three Mother's Day special restaurant ads and asking me which one sounded good to me. :P  So we picked Cafe Maxim, because we were craving good desserts and they're known for their cakes.

When we told some family friends about our reservation, they groaned and berated us because, they said, for $38 a head before tax, there were much better choices in the city.  But we were really intrigued by the seafood pasta option, the all-you-can-eat desserts and the lobster bisque, so we went ahead with it anyway...

Tasty Tuesday/Cupcake Chronicles: Cosmen y Keiless

Early on in my stint in Madrid, I was desperately craving cupcakes, so I did an exhaustive Google search of cupcakeries in the city and Cosmen y Keiless turned up. There were a ton of gorgeous pictures of this quaint, little bakery (little did I know that it's actually a chain), where France seemed to meet the States, so I made the pilgrimmage to the location near Salamanca district on a sunny Saturday afternoon.

Tasty Tuesday: M Thompson Chocolates

Image Source: M Thompson Chocolates Facebook Page

Hi, guys!

In this week’s edition of Tasty Tuesday, I’m taking you all back to Canada. I still have a lot of material to write about on Madrid and Barcelona, but I very recently had this experience, and my eyes quite literally rolled back in my head from the overwhelming deliciousness, so I had to tell you all about it right away.

Tasty Tuesday/Cupcake Chronicles: Happy Day

 (*Sorry this post is late - better late than never, right?  I thought I published this yesterday, but as it turns out, I only saved it. XP  Apparently I'm still recovering from the massive brain cell massacre I suffered in Sororityland.)

Oh, Happy Day!
(Oh, Happy Day...)
Oh, Happy Daaay!!!
(Oh Happy Day...)

As promised, I have lots to tell you about Spanish cupcakes!

Tasty Tuesday/Cupcake Chronicles: Big City Cupcakes

Okay, let's take a break from Spain for a second, because this post is way overdue. Remember my mission to find the best cupcake in Toronto? Well, it wasn't going so well, so I decided to broaden my scope a little bit last summer, when I was in Vancouver for a few days...

The Chocolate Rhythm

When most people say that they are addicted to chocolate, other people just think that they just must really, really like to eat it.  It's goes further than that with me...I think I might really have a problem.  I'm surprised that I haven't written about it more here, actually.  I'd inject Nutella if I could, although I suppose that would defeat the purpose of tasting it. 

Just like at home, Commercial Land is kind of hyperactive here.  Several days after Todos los Santos (November 1st, which is a holiday here), stores start getting stocked with Christmas things.  Now that December is getting closer and closer, all the supermarkets here are getting filled to bursting with chocolate sweets, most notably an absolute ton of turrón, which is basically nougat, and all kinds of chocolates.

All kinds!  And it's all the good stuff from Europe that I love to eat at home, but it's cheaper because Spain is closer to Belgium and Switzerland and Germany and Italy than Canada is.  I just bought a 16-piece box of Ferrero Rocher for 3.90 €, which would retail at home between $6-8.  ¡Olé!

But that was when I started missing the Chocolate Rhythm at home.  Did you know that chocolate has a rhythm in Canada?  Because there is.  And it's a beautiful one, with its graceful ebbs and flows of brown, creamy deliciousness.

Tasty Tuesday: Chocolatería San Ginés

It would be remiss of me to write about the culinary offerings of Madrid without mentioning the famous Chocolatería San Ginés...

Chocolate y churros are a popular breakfast and snack here in Spain. Churros are a kind of...thin pastry, I'd say, that's basically a crispy stick of fried dough that is slightly chewy in the middle (on the left side of the plate, pictured above). They are made to be dipped into hot chocolate (see picture below). They are pretty much nothing like the kind that can be found in Costcos all over North America because the real thing is just incomparable in its texture. :P

The Spanish version of hot chocolate is not for the faint of heart - it is super rich and extra thick, almost like a thin chocolate sauce. The idea is that it's supposed to be thick enough to cling to churros and create a nice coating for them once they're dipped.

Typically, people (well, mainly those who don't have to work) go to their local taberna to enjoy chocolate y churros in the morning while engaging in leisurely conversation and/or catching up on the latest gossip. Because many chocolaterías close very late or open very early in the day, chocolate y churros are also a very popular post-clubbing snack.

However, what's less well-known but just as popular with locals are porras. Porras are just thicker versions of churros (on the right side of the plate in the picture above). They're quite similar to Chinese fried breadsticks, 油炸鬼, except the Chinese variety is salty, more delicate, less doughy, with more holes in them - when made well, anyway.

And the most famous chocolatería in Madrid is the Chocolatería San Ginés, right in the heart of the city just west of the Puerta del Sol. It's been around since 1894 and this restaurant even has its own Wikipedia page! It's been featured in almost every Spain/Madrid travel guide and travel site I've seen, and I did my fair share of research before coming.

The humble entrance with its forest green door frame isn't very eye-catching, but the interior is quite ornate, with nostalgic décor, marble table-tops and a bar that winds around the side and part of the back of the restaurant. In the summertime, tables and chairs are set up outdoors all around the side of the building so that people can eat and people-watch at the same time.

Having said all this, I must say that I don't love their chocolate. (By the way, this will be one of the very rare times that I'll recommend something I don't absolutely adore.) Their churros are out of this world, but the chocolate has this...almost sort of spicy, nutmeggy taste that I'm not fond of. I like my chocolate pure and refined. Additionally, I prefer the churros over the porras because the porras are too dense and bread-like for me; they remind me of poorly-made 油炸鬼, and the fact that they're sweet throws me.

But since chocolate y churros are Spain must-trys and the Chocolatería San Ginés is the most famous place that serves them, I'd recommend that you give this place a try when you're in town...then perhaps compare the experience with that of a local taberna!

Chocolatería San Ginés
Pasadizo de San Ginés, 5
28013 Madrid
España‎
913 656 546‎

Tasty Tuesday: La Mallorquina

What I'm about to say may seem blasphemous to some people, but I really wasn't that impressed by the bakeries when I was living in France. Maybe the bakeries in Nice are especially subpar, but apart from baguettes, a croissant and a ridiculously expensive cookie, I didn't love what Niçois bakeries had to offer. Most of them sold stale pizzas, bread and petit fours that were obviously not house-made.

When I went to Japan and came across their "French-style" bakeries, I thought they were generally way better than the real thing, but even so, I didn't love the chocolate croissants.

So imagine my surprise when I came across the BEST chocolate croissant I've ever tasted right here in Madrid!

You see, traditional pains au chocolat are made of buttery, flaky pastry wrapped around a paltry, skinny line of chocolate running down one side. Spanish napolitanas de chocolate are made of fluffy pastry filled to bursting with rich, smooth, creamy chocolate paste that spans the entire interior of the confection.

My very favourite napolitana de chocolate can be found at the legendary bakery La Mallorquina, which is located at the very heart of the city, right at (one of) the doorsteps of Sol metro station.

There are rows of pastries, cakes and cookies in glass cabinets to choose from, a standing café on the ground floor and a sit-down area on the second floor. But be forewarned that prices upstairs are higher than downstairs!

After some experimenting, I can say that their napolitana de chocolate is their very best product - even better than their cakes (see picture) - so feel free to cut to the chase and head straight for the napolitana de chocolate if you make a trip here. Don't even bother with the regular napolitana, which is filled with custard - the chocolate is a million times better!

I discovered La Mallorquina during my first days in Madrid, back in late June, and I became an instant, avid fan. I was absolutely devastated when they closed for August, like many businesses here do, and I actually had their re-opening date (August 31st) written in my agenda.

Fortunately, the napolitana de chocolate is as good as I remember. Unfortunately, it's smaller than it used to be and the price was raised from 1€ to 1.20€. It'st still totally worth it, though, and I will continue to frequent this establishment - just maybe a little less often than I used to, which is probably better for my waistline, anyway. :P

La Mallorquina
Calle Mayor, 2
28013 Madrid
España‎

Eating Well in Southern France cont'd

We have discourse! You know I love discourse – yay! :D My friend Katherine writes:

"I'll be in Marseille and Nice for about 5 days, combined, in the coming week or so. Do you have any restaurant suggestions?”

I personally didn’t go to Marseille last year, but I hear it’s awesome. Because it’s the second most populated city in France, I would suggest that you stay in Marseille for three days and Nice for two, or to stay in Marseille for two days, and stay in Nice for a day and three nights, taking a day trip to Cannes and Monaco each. From Nice it’s just a short train ride to Cannes (maybe less than an hour and about 9€?) and a super scenic, 1€, 40 minute bus ride to Monaco – and those two places are worth seeing.

Food-wise, I think you’d probably have better luck in Marseille, because as my general rule goes, the more populated a city is, the better the quality and cheaper the food is. In Marseille, you of course should have some bouillabaisse (fish stew), since it’s the regional specialty. However, it’s pretty pricey; I have it on good authority that you shouldn’t pay less than 35-40€ for a decent bouillabaisse, and some people even insist that you should only visit places that requires you to reserve the day before - but I have friends who were very satisfied with walk-in experiences. So that translates to $57-65 CAD, but it might make you feel a little better if you keep in mind that it’s a total meal – the soup and then all the ingredients in it.

In Nice, I’d definitely go to the place I just mentioned, of course, and another absolute must-go is my favourite bakery. Formerly known as Boulangerie de France, now I think it’s either called Gosset or Cosset or something – the sign is a little ambiguous – but it’s located right beside 82 rue de France, on the NW corner of rue de France and rue Andrioli. Don’t mix it up with Le chant du pain, which is two doors east of Gosset. They have all kinds of beautiful sandwiches, and the earlier you go, the more choices there are. I highly recommend the pan bagnat, a niçois specialty, with tuna, hard-boiled eggs, anchovies, olives, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, fresh tomatoes, and lettuce in between a delicious bun. It’s also great value – about 4 or 5 euro and it’s enormous! But most importantly, you MUST, MUST, MUST have their pain au chocolat (aux) amandes. A pain au chocolat is a chocolate croissant, but this version is far superior because above the layer of chocolate, there’s a layer of almond cream; it’s not so much a cream as it is a sort of fine, grainy paste. I can’t even stress to you how amazing it is. It’s way better fresh (go in the morning!), but even after it’s been sitting in the display case for a while, it’s still good. They are very generous with the almond cream, and the almond flavour just punches your taste buds in the guts. There’s less chocolate, but it complements the almond perfectly. It’s just incredible. And at 1.80€ a piece, I often had two at a time.

You may want to try out les farcies, les beignets, pissaladière, salade nicoise and le socca, other Nice specialties; there are plenty of places you can get them at in Vieux Nice (make sure you go there because there’s a lot to see, but not at night because it’s not the safest!) and they taste pretty much the same everywhere, but personally, they’re not my cup of tea. Les farcies are various veggies stuffed with fatty meats and onions and seasonings and such – it’s not bad, but pretty oily and not that great. Les beignets are pretty much just HEAVILY battered foods (onions, sardines, etc.) that are fried and often soggy with oil because they’ve been sitting for a while, and for the life of me, I’ve never been able to find fresh beignets no matter what time of day I eat them. Eating those are like drinking oil, and the sardines are super fishy and bony. Pissaladière is basically tomato sauce-less onion pizza often served with olives and/or anchovies, and salad niçoise is basically a pan bagnat without the bread - the only dish out of all these I like. Socca is a flat kind of bread-type food made with chickpeas, sprinkled with olive oil, salt and pepper. I don’t love it because A) it’s made of chickpeas so it’s sort of rough on the palate, a big no-no for Chinese tastes and B) it tastes like overcooked eggs without much flavour to speak of. But you may want to try it because it’s very typical Nice food, and I feel like I should tell you about these things so you have some basic knowledge of local cuisine. Oh, and because Nice is so close to Italy, there are an absolute ton of wood-oven pizza restaurants, but these pizzas are characteristically paper-thin, not spectacularly tasty and so not very filling or worth it, in my opinion.

Now, what else would I eat? I’d go to my favourite gelato place in the city, Crema di Gelato. There are tons of gelato places in Nice again due to its proximity to Italy, but after lots of tasting, I’ve concluded that this parlour is the crème de la crème. Don’t believe anyone who tells you that Fenocchio is the best – they have lots of choices, but the quality of their product is mediocre at best. Crema di Gelato has the best gelato in town, and they also have pretty little gelato cups (like in the picture) and gelato truffles. I always just get scoops of gelato because you get the most ice cream for your euro. I’d highly recommend the flavour Crema di Gelato, aka crème pralinée, which is vanilla gelato with what I suspect is Nutella gobs on top of it and sprinkled with crunchy pralines. It’s like a vanilla-based, gelato version of Ferrero Rocher and it’s divine. I also love their mint chocolate, hazelnut and caramel flavours. It’s a perfect ending to an Indian meal at the place I described in my last post, and they are located in Vieux Nice, right in the square of the Palais de Justice.

If you’re on a budget, there’s a so-so place right across from the Palais de Justice, the restaurant closest to the beach, that has this great value combo – a salade niçoise or another salad plus a pasta dish, one choice of which is seafood pasta. The salads were good, but the pasta wasn’t that great – but it’s 14€ (or was it 11?) for both.

If money is no object, I’d highly recommend going to Michelin-decorated Keisuke Matsushima, a very classy hole in the wall located at 22 rue de France right on the edge of the zone piétonne (also a must-visit in Nice), where I always wanted to eat at but was too poor to go to. They have seasonal menus, and you have to get their combo, which starts at 35€. For various menu choices you can upgrade if you’re willing to pay more, and I think for 60€ you can let the chef just do his magic and serve whatever he wants. If you do go, let me know how it was!


You might also want to have moules frites, which are mussels with fries. I think they’re nice but not great but worth eating. I’d suggest going to all-you-can-eat restaurants – there’s one in Cours Saleya in Vieux Nice that I don’t recall the name of, and one in the zone piétonne called Il...Borrotolo? Barratello? I don’t remember, but it’s somewhere on rue Masséna. Just look for stand-up signs that say moules frites à volonté – à volonté means all-you-can-eat. My beef with moules frites is that the mussels are often teensy, they don’t pull out the beards of the mussels, they don’t pick out the ones with yucky growths stuck to the shells, and the sauces are too salty, which makes you eat more fries and fill up faster as a result. But if you love mussels, they’re nice. I also hear there are good moules frites restaurants in Belgium. Anyway, the place on Cours Saleya offers I think maybe five flavours at 11.90€ (and you can try any of them) and a bunch of other flavours for 13.90€ - but in this case, I’d recommend being conservative since the basic flavours are the best, from my experience. The place in the zone piétonne offers just three flavours for 13.90€ but they are nicely done and like I said, basic flavours are the best anyway. There’s marinière, which is white wine with onions, napolitaine, which is tomato sauce, and poulette, which is cream sauce. I personally like the first two, not so much the third. I’ve heard good things about having moules frites in Monaco, but they’re not all-you-can-eat.


There’s also a decent Japanese restaurant in Cours Saleya, but it’s also a little pricey (18€ for a 14-piece set meal) and so not good if you’re a bigt eater like me. The quality is pretty good though, and the chef is actually Japanese. But if you don’t mind splurging about 20-30€ once, I’d also suggest eating at one of the beach restaurants because the Mediterranean is just a stunning backdrop. I’d recommend the restaurants Lido Plage, or Le Sporting. The beach restaurants in Nice are cheaper than in Cannes, but the shopping in Cannes is way cheaper, so I’d suggest eating in Nice and shopping Cannes.

Hope this info is helpful, feel free to ask if you have more questions and have a great trip! :)

Cupcake Chronicles: The Cupcake Shoppe

When I was living in Nowheresville Nice, France, I was very deprived of good food, and I had this masochistic habit of torturing myself by watching Hong Kong food shows and cooking tutorials on Youtube, as well as reading colourful food blogs. My brother would encourage me by sending me food pictures he took himself and links to Toronto food blogs, so that I could keep a list of all the things I could eat and restaurants I could visit when I came home (and had no access to at the time).

One day, I was suffering from a particularly violent bout of cupcake craving, so I decided to look for cupcake bakeries in Toronto, to add to my list. I found this link, which is an excellent place to start, except none of the bakeries have particularly high ratings, so either there are no excellent cupcake places in Toronto or we’re just really hard raters. Unfortunately, all the bakeries with the highest ratings are kind of far from me – in the beaches area – so I set my sights on going to The Cupcake Shoppe first. It’s closest to me, I’ve been past it a couple times, and I’ve always wanted to go in, because their branding is so well done. They definitely have the nicest website and cutest illustrations/signs out of all the local cupcake bakeries I’ve seen. Everything about this place seems so attractive, and I was going to go with an open mind, regardless of the paltry, barely-passing 2.7/5 stars it’s rated.

Well, I wish I’d paid more attention to the reviews, because they were pretty accurate; there are good and bad ones, but there’s a pronounced trend towards the negative. The store was adorable, but the products themselves were nothing to write home about – not that cute, not that tasty, and just not all that exciting. I bought six different flavours, and if I were blindfolded, I wouldn’t have been able to tell the difference between any of them besides chocolate or vanilla cake. They were dry, stale, hard and completely disappointing. My mum remarked that mine taste way better, and my cupcakes all come out of a box. She also said that the ones we buy in six-packs from the supermarket are better.

She has a point, because supermarket cupcakes really are good. My super serious, super distinguished ER surgeon Uncle Alex would know; he proves that anyone can have a soft spot for cupcakes. Even he couldn’t resist the ones I had sitting on my dinner table when he was visiting once and asked me if he could have one. Of course he could, I told him, and after he demolished it in the most dignified way I’ve ever seen anyone eat a cupcake, he dabbed his mouth gently with his napkin, set it down and said to me in his very refined New Zealand accent, “Well, those are very nice and moist, aren’t they?”

But you know what? At least 50% of the cupcake experience isn’t even about how it tastes. The quality is just as important as the appearance, the childhood memories, and, in the realm of cupcake houses, the whole shopping experience. A big reason why all these people (including myself) have such a bad opinion of The Cupcake Shoppe is because the service is so awful. When I was there, the staff barely acknowledged my existence and they acted as if they would rather be anywhere else in the world. They didn’t say hi or even speak to me except to tell me how much I had to pay. According to reviews, I wasn’t the only one. The store had all the makings of a spectacular shopping experience – cute décor, cute displays, inherently cute (albeit only passable quality) product – but the service ruined it all.

So if idiot-proof cake mixes and generic supermarket bakeries produce better quality cupcakes than specialized, boutique cupcakes houses, what does that say about the Toronto Cupcakescape? But I’m not going to let this unsatisfactory first outing deter me. I won’t lose faith. I’m going to continue on in my search of a slammin’ cupcake in Toronto, and I’ll document every step in my Cupcake Chronicles. :)

Happy Canada Day!

Photo credit: Sebastian White Online

Living in Baked Goods Heaven

Thanks to everyone for your kind wishes. I lit a candle for my friend at Monaco's St. Nicholas Cathedral yesterday, since her family is devoutly Christian. She is very strong and she's trying hard to recover and move on with her life, so, as an homage to her, I'm going to move on as well.

So! My Londonite flatmate thinks it’s hilarious that I call UK “The Land of the Most Wearable Flag”. I also refer to France with a number of endearments, one of which is Baked Goods Heaven, because there’s literally a bakery around every corner. I wonder how they can all stay in business because there is just so much competition, but my local friends assure me that France can support virtually any number of bakeries that crop up because it’s just their way of life. They happen to eat a ton of baked goods, and there will always be a demand for it.

But I realized that not all bakeries were created equal, because the ones that are labelled “Artisan(ales)” make much yummier stuff. There’s a huge difference between regular bakery products and artisan bakery products, and it’s completely obvious from the first bite. The first few nights I was here, I survived almost entirely on the exquisite baguettes from the Artisan Boulanger in Magnan, right around the corner from the hotel I stayed at. It was the most incredible stick of bread I had ever eaten up to that point – the crust was delightfully crispy and the inside was light as air – and I naively assumed that all bakeries here are that amazing, but I had a reality check when I started shopping around. It also helps to talk to and befriend locals, because that’s how you can get insider information on which bakeries specialize in what. For example, sometimes, a bakery that specializes only in bread may make their own bread but buy their pastries to sell.

I was delighted to discover that there’s a fantastic bakery right around the corner from where I live, called Le Chant du Pain, on the northwest corner of Andrioli and Rue de France. Originally, I was craving a brioche au sucre (a round, fragrant bun about the size of a palm, sprinkled with crumbly, coarse sugar), but when I walked in, this huge, lush confection caught my eye. It had about an inch-high layer of cream between two layers of pastry, and it was topped with crumbly sugar chunks – even better than just a brioche au sucre! The kind lady behind the counter told me that it’s called a tropézienne, and I just had to try it. I also bought a baguette to make a sandwich with for dinner, and on impulse, I also got a slice of apple pie.

Well, I never got around to making that sandwich, because I ate everything in a single setting; it was so good! The tropézienne was unbelievable – the sweet cream was rich, but fluffy and the layers of pastry were so buttery! And I must admit, I have a soft spot for crumbly sugar, because they just have the most lovely texture to bite into. And that baguette! It’s different from the Magnan one, but it’s just as good. I like it because it’s not super skinny, so it’s more versatile – you can spread things on it, dip it in soups and sauces, or you can make sandwiches out of it. And the beauty of thicker baguettes is that there’s more soft, fluffy stuff in the middle. The top was very crispy, the golden-brown bottom was crusty and flavourful, and the middle was smooth, soft and punctuated with big air bubbles. I buttered broken off pieces and finished it in the blink of an eye. The honour for Best Apple Pie, however, remains with that of J. Multari - there's one on Gambetta & Bottero and one downtown, as well. However, I'll definitely be going back to my local bakery, Le Chant soon.

I better watch it, because if I eat like this every day, I won’t be able to buy any of the gorgeous, European-sized clothes here!

Brook's Delectable Chocolates

Image Source

This chocolate is SO unbelievably delicious. I once told Brook that a person can buy my affection with her chocolate, and it's still true. If I were only allowed to eat one kind of chocolate for the rest of my life (God forbid!), this would be it.

Brook's chocolate almond brittle has been a huge favourite of mine since I began frequenting the craft show circuit when my mum first began her business in '97. Every year at the One of A Kind Toronto Christmas show, my mom buys me a small bag - then at a different aisle, I'd tell her I have to "go to the bathroom," then I'd buy the large $25 bag and sneak it in my purse, swearing Brook to secrecy. I can easily inhale the $5 bag, the smallest, in two seconds flat, so I need a more substantial size, you know?

It's rich, imported milk chocolate surrounding the most delicious buttery brittle you will ever taste, with a ton of almonds around and in the confection. The middle is something else because Brook doesn't scrimp on her ingredients (you can't mistake the scrumptious buttery and maple syrup flavours) and because it's got this lovely, slightly crunchy, super brittle texture. By that I mean it's crunchy, but it breaks apart cleanly with the slightest pressure from you teeth and it doesn't stick to your molars (unless you buy a bag and let it sit for a year and don't eat it until a lot later - I learned this when I delightedly found a forgotten bag somewhere in the black hole that is our pantry).

As of 2006, this candy is also available in dark chocolate for those who are health conscious, chocolate snobs or both. I think I should work out some sort of plan with Brook so that she will bill me and send me a bag every fixed period…

For more information or to order, visit http://www.brookschocolates.com/.